Penguins Under Attack: Who's Hunting These Flightless Birds?

#animals
#pets
#penguin
#wildlife
pet, any animal kept by human beings as a source of companionship and pleasure.

While a pet is generally kept for the pleasure that it can give to its owner, often, especially with horses, dogs, and cats, as well as with some other domesticated animals, this pleasure appears to be mutual. Thus, pet keeping can be described as a symbiotic relationship, one that benefits both animals and human beings. As the keeping of pets has been practiced from prehistoric times to the present and as pets are found in nearly every culture and society, pet keeping apparently satisfies a deep, universal human need.
The history of pets is intertwined with the process of animal domestication, and it is likely that the dog, as the first domesticated species, was also the first pet. Perhaps the initial steps toward domestication were taken largely through the widespread human practice of making pets of captured young wild animals. Eventually, a working relationship developed between the dogs and their human captors. The dog was swifter, had stronger jaws, and was better at tracking prey; therefore, it could be of great use in hunting and guarding duties. From human beings, on the other hand, the dogs were assured of a constant supply of food as well as warmth from the fire. There is indirect evidence that the dog may have been domesticated and kept as a pet since Paleolithic times, as can be surmised from the paintings and carvings that archaeologists have found in ancient campsites and tombs. In Mesopotamia, dogs that look remarkably like the present-day mastiff were shown participating in a lion hunt. Domestic pets were often depicted in the scenes of family life in ancient Egypt; hunting dogs of the greyhound or saluki type accompany their master to the chase, and lap dogs frequently sit under the chair of their master or mistress.
Next to the dog, horses and cats are the animals most intimately associated with human beings. Surprisingly, both these animal groups were domesticated rather late in human history. There is no evidence that horses were domesticated in Paleolithic or Mesolithic times, but by about 2000 BCE horses used in chariot battles were an established phenomenon throughout the Middle East. It seems that riding astride horses was a practice developed a few centuries later (see horsemanship). The cat too does not seem to have been domesticated as a pet until the New Kingdom period (about the 16th century BCE) in Egypt. This is all the more strange as the ancient Egyptians had tamed many types of animals, such as lions, hyenas, monkeys, the Nile goose, and dogs, since the Old Kingdom period. But once cats were finally domesticated, their popularity was enormous. Gradually, the cat became one of the most universally worshiped animals.
As has been noted, the primary bond distinguishing a pet-and-owner relationship is affection.
Fish
Fish are aquatic animals in the phylum Chordata and are grouped together with other vertebrates. Fish are distinguished from other animals because they have scales, fins, and gills. Being cold-blooded animals, fish need to swim in water of the right temperature to control their body temperature.
Birds
Birds are a class of animals that contains the greatest number of flying vertebrates. The category of birds is identified by the fact that they have feathers. In fact, birds are the only class of animals that have feathers. Even though all types of birds start life as an egg and most birds fly, other classes of animals also share those characteristics.
Mammals
Mammals are a class of animals that we are most familiar with. Humans like to keep mammals such as dogs, cats, rabbits, and even pigs as pets. Interestingly, the animal class called Mammalia is not the largest class of animals. There are only about 4,000 types of mammals compared to over 900,000 various types of insects.
Reptiles

Penguins are a group of flightless birds that are found in the Southern Hemisphere, particularly in Antarctica, but also in South America, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. There are 18 species of penguins, varying in size from the smallest, the Little Blue Penguin, which stands at just 16 inches tall, to the largest, the Emperor Penguin, which can grow up to 4 feet tall.

Penguins are well adapted to their aquatic lifestyle and their wings have evolved into flippers, which they use to swim in the water. They are excellent swimmers and can reach speeds of up to 22 mph. Their bones are solid and heavy, which helps them to dive deep into the water to catch fish, krill, and squid, which make up the majority of their diet.

Penguins are social animals and live in large colonies, sometimes numbering in the millions. They have a unique courtship behavior, where the male will present a pebble to the female as a gift. They are also known for their distinctive waddling gait on land and their comical appearance, which has made them popular with people all over the world.